Shake it, baby
by coffeemuse
Summary: "Hey, baby girl. Whatcha doin' in there, huh?" Kate coos at her swollen belly. At twenty five weeks, her little one is rambunctious inside of her. Kate watches with amusement as her daughter jets out her limbs and swivels around, Kate's whole belly shaking with every movement. (Short one-shot)


I got this idea after I played around with my best friend's pregnant belly. For those of you who don't know-if you're far enough along you can actually /see/ the baby move around and if you poke and press on the stomach the baby will twist around and jab its limbs out. It's so freaky but so awesome at the same time.

"Hey, baby girl. Whatcha doin' in there, huh?" Kate coos at her swollen belly. At twenty-five weeks, her little one is rambunctious inside of her. Kate watches with amusement as her daughter jets out her limbs and swivels around; Kate's whole belly shaking with every movement.

Castle is in bed next to her. His face is lit up with pure enjoyment, his eyes never leaving her stomach. Kate's leaned up against the headboard, half laying down, and Castle is right beside her on his stomach, his chin resting on his arms watching the show before him.

"This is so cool," Castle comments, as he hoists himself up on his left forearm and uses his right hand to rub her belly.

"Alexis didn't do this with Meredith?" Kate inquires. She softly jabs her pointer finger into the side of her belly, and the baby is quick to react-one of her little arms, or so Kate thinks, comes jetting out of her as she tries to get away from the sudden disturbance causing Kate to chuckle.

"Nah. Alexis was always a very calm baby, she'd kick in protest if Meredith was talking too loudly, though."

Kate snorts. "Great, that means this one's going to be a handful."

Castle sits up fully, sitting indian-style at Kate's belly. He rests both hands on top of her and lightly pushes her stomach back and forth, causing the baby to tumble around more aggressively. Suddenly, Kate hisses in pain, swatting his hands away. She rubs around her rib cage where the baby has seemingly kicked her in anger, clearly protesting against Castle's playfulness.

"Did daddy make you mad, huh?" She rubs her hand fully over her belly, as if to comfort her daughter. The tumbling stops almost immediately, but Kate keeps running a soothing hand over her.

Castle stares at Kate with complete admiration, that dumb, goofy smile embedded on his face; the kind of smile he gets when Alexis is telling him about something that makes her happy, or when Kate first told him she was pregnant. Come to think of it, she's pretty sure that dorky grin has been on his face for the past five months.

Which, she's grateful for, seeing as how she thought he'd completely freak out over it. But instead, he gave her that goofy smile and embraced her with so much love and joy that she almost burst at the seams with happiness.

They're both staring at each other now, both lost in thought. Kate blinks a few times, a smile comes across her face.

"Wanna see something cool?" Kate asks him, calling him out of his head.

"Cooler than this?" He asks, eyebrows shooting up with curiosity.

Kate sits up a bit, pulls her shirt more up as well. She rests both hands lightly on either side of her stomach, and starts to firmly rub.

"Hey, little one," Kate murmurs, her voice low and steady. She keeps rubbing and talking in that tone, and after a few minutes, a hand appears right next to Kate's belly button, her skin highlighting it.

Castle's jaw drops, but quickly turns into a befuddled smile. "Holy crap, she's an alien."

Kate whacks him in the chest with the back of her hand for that, but still laughs.

"Cool right?" She glances over at him, watches as he traces their baby's hand with his finger, his head tilted to the side, that goofy smile still there. The little hand disappears and Kate's belly jiggles around a second more before fully stopping.

"Ready for bed, baby?" Castle says, leaning down to kiss Kate's stomach. He pulls her night-shirt down, and moves her legs so that he can lift the duvet over the both of them.

He settles down next to her, and she scoots into his side, resting her head on his shoulder, her belly tilted and resting against his hip. Since she can't fully lay on her side anymore these days, she uses Castle as a prop.

"Night, mommy." Castle whispers, turning his head to kiss her forehead, a smile ghosting his face.

Kate beams up at him, the thought her of being an actual mother soon exciting her. She grins at him, kisses his chin. "G'night, daddy."


End file.
